An Exercise in Terror: What I’ve Learned from Narrowing the Focus of My Firm

I was honoured to be asked to present a talk at this year’s IDSA International Conference in Austin, Texas. The room was full of designers, managers, and firm owners, and the theme was “Exchange”, so I shared the story of how we’ve used specialization as a marketing and positioning strategy for our firm.

The topic of specialization seems to be on everyone’s tongues these days in the design sector, from industrial designers to architecture firms, it is an often discussed as a strategy for gaining an advantage in a highly competitive industry and challenging economic times, but it’s also a terrifying idea for many—and for good reason. In my talk I discussed how we came to choose brand strategy and identity design specifically for the AEC sector, challenges we had to overcome, sacrifices made along the way, and results we’ve seen since claiming this specialization.

Here is a link to a video of my presentation, along with some online chatter it spawned: An Exercise in Terror: What I’ve Learned from Narrowing the Focus of My Firm